Part 49 (1/2)
”Your cousin? I should say that whatever Mrs. Meadows does is well done.”
”You would approve?”
”Of course I would. People like that are bound to be in the right.”
”Really ...?”
The fireworks were splendid; altogether, Saint Eulalia's day proved a tremendous success. The festal joy was only marred by the unseemly behaviour of Miss Wilberforce, who profited by the occasion to let off some fireworks, or at least steam, of her own.
In broad daylight too.
This was something new, and rather ominous.
The dear lady was becoming quite a problem.
CHAPTER x.x.xVIII
Men looked down from the market-place that afternoon and beheld a gaily-coloured throng moving about Madame Steynlin's awkwardly situated promontory. Her house and its wide terrace overhanging the sea were filled with guests. The entertainment differed from the receptions of the d.u.c.h.ess. It was more rustic and unrestrained--more in the nature of a picnic. Everything possible had been done to convert that tongue of land, that refractory stretch of trachyte, into a garden. Paths were blasted through the rock; those few scarred olives, the aboriginals, had been supplanted by whatever flowers and shade-giving trees could be induced, with a.s.siduous waterings, to strike roots into the arid soil.
It was still rather a transparent place.
A number of new people had lately arrived on Nepenthe in favour of whom the hostess, with the frank cordiality of her nature, had issued invitations broadcast. There was the celebrated R. A. and his dowdy wife; a group of American politicians who were supposed to be reporting on economic questions and spent the Government's money in carousing about Europe; Madame Albert, the lady doctor from Lyons whose unique combination of magic and ma.s.sage (a family secret) had brought the expiring Prince of Philippopolis to life again; an Italian senator with his two pretty daughters; a bluff hilarious Scotchman, Mr. Jameson, who, as a matter of fact, had done seven years for forgery but did not like to have it brought up against him; some sisters of charity; a grizzled sea-captain who was making discreet enquiries about a safe place for a s.h.i.+pwreck, having been promised by the owners twenty per cent of his vessel's insurance money; a dilapidated Viscount and his SOI-DISTANT niece; two fluffy Danish ladies who always travelled together and smiled at everything, though the younger one smiled in such a horrible knowing fas.h.i.+on that you could not help disliking her; Mrs. Roger Rumbold who addressed meetings to advocate Infanticide for the Ma.s.ses; Mr. Bernard of the Entomological Society-author of THE COURTs.h.i.+P OF c.o.c.kROACHES; another young man of pleasant exterior who was held to be an architect because his brother used to be employed in a well-known engineering firm, and several more.
The exclusive Mr. Eames was absent. He sat at home, thinking how narrowly he had escaped imprisonment at the hands of Signor Malipizzo, in connection with Muhlen's disappearance. The closest shave of all his life! It showed how right Keith had been in bidding him keep on the right side of the law--on the right side of the judge--rather than trust to the promptings of a ”good conscience.” The d.u.c.h.ess likewise sent her excuses. She was so troubled about the pamphlet that Don Francesco hardly dared to leave her side. He, therefore, was also absent; so was the bereaved Commissioner. Mrs. Meadows had driven home again long ago.
Van Koppen intended to sail in the early hours of next morning. The bishop and Denis were likewise on the verge of departure. A break-up was at hand.
Mr. Keith alone refused to budge. He was waiting for the first cicada whose strident call was due, he declared, in a week's time. Till then he proposed to remain on Nepenthe.
”Fancy waiting for an insect,” said his friend van Koppen. ”I believe, Keith, you've got a sentimental streak somewhere.”
”I have been fighting against it all my life. A man ought to dominate his reflexes. But if the insect keeps good time--why not?”
He was in an elegiac mood, though he meant to drive away his cares later in the evening by the ”Falernian system.” He felt the exodus in the air. Another spring drawing to its close--everybody scattering! He was filled, too, with that peculiar pensiveness which troubles complex people when they have done a kindly act. Virtue had gone out of him.
He had wrought a miracle.
The moist look in the eye of his hostess testified to the miracle; so did her frock which, being of pink muslin, harmonized with the state of her mind but not with her complexion. Peter the Great had escaped from prison. Not only he, but all the others were at liberty once more, including the Messiah who, after some attentions on the part of the communal doctor, had been put to bed like a little child. The rest of them filled her trim walks with their gleeful laughter and bright raiment; they devoured abundant wines and food at those refreshment tables which groaned under the weight of good things. One could trust Madame Steynlin to attend to the commissariat department. She knew how to gladden the human heart. That of Peter the Great was gladdened to such an extent that he soon began to perform a Russian peasant dance, A PAS SEUL, to the delight of the a.s.sembled guests. It was a cheery interlude with a disastrous ending, for the rough terrace being different from what he expected, he stumbled and fell full length upon the ground. There he lay, laughing, like a young giant refreshed with wine.
”I don't know how you have done it, Mr. Keith,” she said, ”and I am not going to ask. But I shall never forget this kindness of yours.”
”Would you not do the same for me? I imagine, between ourselves, that the judge has been a good deal fl.u.s.tered with this trial and the intervention of Don Giustino. Perhaps he lost his head. We are all liable to that, are we not? He is a nervous man; but quite a good fellow if one keeps on the right side of him. It is so easy to keep on the right side of people. I often wonder, Madame Steynlin, why men are so full of bitterness towards each other. It is one of the things I shall never live to understand. And another is this problem of music!
Will you help me to grasp the pleasure which you seem to derive from it? Helmholtz does not bring me much further. He explains why certain sounds are necessarily disagreeable--”